Gender responsive approach for girls in the juvenile justice system represents an emerging trend in communities and courts throughout the United States, Australia and Latin America, as an increasing number of girls are entering the juvenile justice system. A gender responsive approach within the juvenile justice system emphasizes considering the unique circumstances and needs of females when designing juvenile justice system structures, policies, and procedures.
Circumstances to be considered
A new approach to juvenile justice or juvenile delinquency for females is to factor in the idea that they have different experiences than males. Girls who have negative childhood experiences, such as neglect, physical or sexual abuse, are at a greater risk to become delinquent (Violence in the Juvenile Justice system). Girls have higher rates of mental health issues such as anger, depression, suicidal thinking, victimization, violence, and abuse than boys. They also have a different reaction in society to behaviors that they may be participating in. Juvenile female offenders are often "low risk" and "high needs". These factors exclusive to girls make gender specific responses appropriate and needed.
Gender trends in system entry
Girls are now the fastest growing segment of Juvenile Justice population. In the United States from 1991 to 2000, the number of arrests of juvenile girls increased at a faster rate than the arrest rate for boys as a general trend. In areas where arrests numbers for boys and girls decreased, the rate for girls decreased less rapidly, indicating differential trends by gender. From 1985 to 2009, the overall number of delinquent crimes committed by juvenile girls increased by 86% while it increased by only 17% of juvenile boys in the U.S. A 2015 report by the Georgetown Law Center on Poverty and Inequality and the Human Rights Project for Girls provided statistics on the number of girls entering the juvenile justice system in the United States by race. Girls of color were disproportionately represented in the juvenile justice system. 123 per 100,000 African-American girls were in residential placement compared with 47 per 100,000 Latinas, 179 per 100,000 Native American girls, and 37 per 100,000 non-Hispanic white girls. There is not evidence that these trends are the result of increases in crime rate by girls in the United States, and researchers have attributed the increasing arrest rate for girls to changes in sentencing practices. Potential reasons for the increase in arrest rate of juvenile girls suggested by the Girls Study Group of the U.S. Department of Justice's Office of Juvenile Justice include changes in enforcement for non-serious, status offenses, which are the charges most commonly brought against girls. These types of offences, which are described as status or minor offenses, include but are not limited to running away from home, shoplifting, family abuse, truancy, drug offenses and prostitution. Many of these behaviors are deemed to be survival behaviors meaning that they are behaviors used to survive abuse or neglectful situations.
Human trafficking is one of the causes of prostitution charges and is handled in gender specific courts as a victimization crime. In Texas the Supreme Court ruled that girls younger than 14 years old involved in prostitution should be considered victims and provided services without criminalization.